Well, I'm putting miles on the xb9 because the 1125's ignition switch harness is failing again. Either my solder joints have failed, or the other wires are pulling apart. Either way, I'm rebuilding the harness fully when I have time.

Well, I'm putting miles on the xb9 because the 1125's ignition switch harness is failing again. Either my solder joints have failed, or the other wires are pulling apart. Either way, I'm rebuilding the harness fully when I have time.

Make sure you use real 60/40, and not lead-free solder. Lead-free is great for RoHS, but shit for performance when exposed to vibration.

My ass feels broken but 2 great days of riding. Left my house 7:00 a.m. Saturday morning, rode to the ride leader's place in Castro valley and did another 250 on top of the 50 to get to her place. We rode through Yosemite (my first time back there since I went there 4 years ago and my first time on a bike) and down to Bishop. Incidentally heat was barely a factor on day 1, it was in the mid 60s until we got down into the dessert where it shot up to mid 80s but still pretty bearable. The next day figuring it would be hot again I wore minimal clothing under my jacket and we had to pull over after 60 miles to put on more clothes but then it warmed up and eventually REALLY warmed up but at no time was it over85-88.

We had 4 dual sports, 3 x GSs (1200,800, 650) and 1 x Wee-Strom 650....and one Harley Davidson cruiser. He did it just great and other than the small fuel tank it was super reliable (and likely plenty comfortable). The guy riding it I hadn't ridden with before, he's an older guy who is dating the ride leader and turned out to be super chill and funny and friendly.

Incidentally the ONLY bikes I saw for 2 days were dual sports (90% BMW) and Harley Davidsons. I swear other than 1 KLR I cannot recall a non-BMW or non-Harley. Oh wait, sorry , I also saw more Goldwings in 2 days than I've seen in my life. All the riders regardless of what they were on were super friendly.

So I broke my 300 mile cherry,for a total of 610 miles over 2 days. It's not as bad as I expected, the more I ride the less it hurts after and my ass seems to get used to it. Definitely investing in a comfort seat. I figure if I woke up early and didn't stop other than for fuel, food, walking breaks I could comfortably do about 500 miles in a day, but wouldn't want to do more.

1100km took me 3 days to recover from. But with a better seat I might get that recovery down to 2.

I worry about staying mentally sharp over that many hours of riding.

Incidentally I got to try out the SENA communications feature. It was a bit wonky but I think it's because all 3 of us were on different firmwares (the latest one added voice updates which is pretty cool),so we ended up in a situation where I could call one friend, and he could call the 3rd friend (or she him) but she could only call me, I couldn't ping her. Tomorrow I'm going to update everybody to v4.0 at work. But damn the quality is amazing, and it's is INCREDIBLY useful as both a tool of convenience and safety to be able to communicate on long rides. I am totally spoiled now.

Looks like y'all have a great day for riding - hope you have a fabulous time!

We did - it was a nice 400mi ride. My ass was hurting by the end, but its a great trip to do once or twice a year. 88 Degrees and sunny over on the other side. I think I got some pics - I'll post em up tomorrow! =D

Taught a really good BRC this weekend. We've switched to the summer schedule, so we have class Friday night, then range Saturday morning, class Saturday afternoon, and range Sunday morning. We do it that way so students aren't out riding in the heat of the day, and it worked out really well. It was especially nice because the other RC I was working with taught on Friday morning and didn't want to do class Friday night, so I did the Friday class and he did the Saturday class, so I was done by 1pm both days. It rocked.

We had a couple sport bike riders that had been riding for a while with no license and got busted. I'm glad they took the class--they had some pretty fundamental riding problems when they came in that were fixed by the time they left. Hopefully they're going to be safer, more skillful riders now.

I'm running a mismatched set right now, actually - a PR3 on the back and a "whatever it was stock" on the front. No issues that I've noted, although I am looking forward to it being time to swap the front out for a PR3 when it's done.

It's going to be a big fat no on motorcycle camping for me - that's why I bought a damned trailer. Now, if you want to go to a campground where I can take the trailer, I'm up for that. Of course, you're probably too late to get campground reservations for much of the Puget Sound for anytime this summer already, when we were camping a couple years ago we'd reserve our sites around February.

That is the conventional wisdom, I know, but it hasn't always been the case for me. I've gotten equally good deals in Spring, Summer and Fall. The GSX-R definitely fit the textbook motorcycle deal: November, starting to snow and the guy had thousands in credit card debt to pay down. The rest have all been about being alert and recognizing a good deal. The people selling the bikes I'm interested in are generally older, not desperate for money and want to see their bike go to a good home. Actually, the worst deal I've gotten was probably buying the Tiger in December. The guy really wasn't sure he wanted to sell it. He was worried his wife would spend the money on furniture before he could find the Speed Triple he was looking for.

In this case, I should be riding my new-to-me WR250R home on Thursday for about half the price of a new one and $800 less than the one I looked at last Fall. The previous owner just wasn't riding it as much as he thought he was going to and would rather have the cash for building a garage. I should be able to sell my KLR for a good bit more and have a few hundred left over for some accessories.

Well, I had an adventure over the Memorial Day weekend. For those of you who don't live in the Pacific NW, you don't know what the weather was like that weekend. Let me tell you about it.

So I was planning on a camping trip with my friend in Oregon that I only get to see about every 2 years. I look at the weather forecast and it says there might be a chance of showers but partly cloudy all day. Obviously the weather app had the wrong damn location because I was pretty much soaking wet by the time I got to the freeway. Well, hopefully it'll clear up as I get south.

The storm front in question spent the weekend moving south.

Long story short, between Kirkland, WA and the mountains east of Eugene, OR I had about 20-ish miles of NOT rainy ride. Add in that there were a few key instructions missing from my driving directions, and a puddle that decided it liked me in a "Different Way", (i.e. 90 degrees to the right), I spent just a hair over 8 hours in the pouring rain. When I finally arrived at the camp site, my entire right side was covered in mud, I arrived Thursday and my feet weren't dry until Saturday, and my Epic Saddle Bags are fantastic! (because they kept my block out of the evil Small-Pond-Of-Doom) Note to viewers, Super Slab Dunlops are NOT viable for dirt/gravel/mud roads.

So, what was the consensus on cleaning leather winter-weight gloves? Other than buy a new pair? They're still perfectly fine, just smelling a little funky.

In other news, I found yesterday that the left hinge on my visor was broken, damn, so I need to get a new visor for my helmet.

Then I found that they cost $40 and up no matter where you go, DAMN! Ow, Ow, Frakkity OW! For a piece of punch-cut plastic? WTF? Oh yeah, "Biker Tax". Sheesh!

In other questions, has anyone ever had their helmets repainted? Is there anything in particular I should tell my artist about before he airbrushes it? Any specific type of clear coat or sealant or layering that needs to happen?

I know that curve very well. It's an S-curve on a local highway that comes after a long straight. The curve is hidden by a steep hillside and wide tunnel/overpass, after which there are tons of driveways, so traffic tends to slow down a lot.

I can easily see here getting up to 80, as many cars do, hitting the curve, and slamming into a truck that is almost stopped because a commuter just pulled onto the road. Or because someone slowed down to enter the car dealership right after the curve. While I do over 60 approaching the curve, I always exit the first half of the S doing under 40 to give me room to stop, even in my car.

The comments on that are interesting, and show a whole lot of stupid themselves. I'm going to go with your assessment of "new rider, new bike, speeding = death" quite frankly. Not that the circumstances diminish the pain of her death, but they illustrate her own stupidity and culpability. *sigh*

Kinda bothers me how when anyone does try to do a crash analysis or critique the dead rider there's always a dogpile of "Hey someone died, show some respect?" even if they were riding naked down the wrong side of the freeway while drunk.

Happens on BARF all the time. Someone died recently because they gassed it through a red, the rider died and his passenger(wife) was injured, and neither were wearing gear besides helmets. People call attention to this, and people are all "STFU, he was an experienced rider, stop bad-mouthing the dead!"

Kinda bothers me how when anyone does try to do a crash analysis or critique the dead rider there's always a dogpile of "Hey someone died, show some respect?" even if they were riding naked down the wrong side of the freeway while drunk.

Happens on BARF all the time. Someone died recently because they gassed it through a red, the rider died and his passenger(wife) was injured, and neither were wearing gear besides helmets. People call attention to this, and people are all "STFU, he was an experienced rider, stop bad-mouthing the dead!"

++

If I die in a crash, I give you all permission to pick apart exactly how stupid I was.

I'm all for post-crash deconstruction. Even if it does end up as "the rider was a pure dumbshit on several levels."

Agreed.

I don't understand the mentality of "don't talk bad about the dead." The fact is, someone who died in a motorcycle crash may have just had their dumbest ever moment, and it cost them their life.

It's like we teach in the BRC, crashes are typically due to a combination of factors. Some of those factors are internal to the rider--lack of skill, lack of mental awareness, etc. There's nothing wrong with pointing to those as causes.

What I *really* hate to see is when a rider crashes and other riders point only to the external factors. Like my crash, it's dumb to only blame the crash on the sand. I could have ridden in the tire tracks and stayed out of the deep sand, I simply failed to do so.

I'm all for post-crash deconstruction. Even if it does end up as "the rider was a pure dumbshit on several levels."

Agreed.

I don't understand the mentality of "don't talk bad about the dead." The fact is, someone who died in a motorcycle crash may have just had their dumbest ever moment, and it cost them their life.

It's like we teach in the BRC, crashes are typically due to a combination of factors. Some of those factors are internal to the rider--lack of skill, lack of mental awareness, etc. There's nothing wrong with pointing to those as causes.

What I *really* hate to see is when a rider crashes and other riders point only to the external factors. Like my crash, it's dumb to only blame the crash on the sand. I could have ridden in the tire tracks and stayed out of the deep sand, I simply failed to do so.

I think I agree with you overall. I suspect the backlash is because anytime a motorcyclist gets killed there will be those who say things like "oh motorcycles are just dangerous" or "all motorcyclists are reckless idiots". Sometimes it could just be that some car hit them and there was very little they could do about it.

That being said, backlashing against what no one is saying and telling anyone trying to examine the situation critically to shut up isn't necessary either. I think they're just responding to an anti-motorcycle straw man

I made an appointment to have my bike looked at by the dealer regarding the gear indicator issue. Fairly certain after some research it is the potentiometer. I've heard of guys having it replaced 2-3 times.

Which brings me to another question: At what point can something repeatedly break (under warranty) to the point that it becomes obvious that the part in question is a "lemon", and will break no matter what? What do vehicle salespeople do? The gear indicator is a feature I like, but it wouldn't stop me from riding the bike, but would be disappointing if it constantly broke.

I've said this before and it's no slight on you Saint, but I think a gear indicator is a crutch that prevents you from learning how to know what gear your bike is in without an indicator. You should just know based on speed/RPM/the way the engine sounds/the way the bike feels. As far as the warranty thing, I have no idea.

I've said this before and it's no slight on you Saint, but I think a gear indicator is a crutch that prevents you from learning how to know what gear your bike is in without an indicator. You should just know based on speed/RPM/the way the engine sounds/the way the bike feels.

Ironically I agree with you. I feel like I "leveled up" again after this weekend's 600 mile 2 day ride, and towards the end I virtually never looked down. I can ride by feel alone just fine, which is especially easy on this bike because it's very hard to stall and if you're in too high a gear it usually still pulls. It IS a crutch that I am outgrowing but it's more info that can't hurt if I feel I need it, and it irks me when things don't work right. Might as well get it fixed under warranty.

I feel like I "leveled up" again after this weekend's 600 mile 2 day ride, and towards the end I virtually never looked down.

That's great to hear!

Quote:

Might as well get it fixed under warranty.

I aggree on this one, but how many times do you want to bring it to the dealer before they either buy it back or give up on it.

Well this is the first time so we'll see what happens. Eventually I'd consider asking them for the part but I'd just hold onto it for when I sell then bike likely post-warranty.

Incidentally I've hit 4000 miles in just over 2 months of riding, which means I'll blow through the warranty in 1.5 years vs. the 3 years time-wise. I'm starting to consider keeping the FZ6 as a commuter...but I'd also rather just own one bike.